Syria on Deluge For Arab ‘Regime Change’

CrossFireArabia
Opinion
December 9, 2024

In less than a week, the Bashar al-Assad regime and that of this family fell, an era that lasted for more than half a century came to an end.

There is no room here to talk about that era, but the end was expected for a long time, as dictatorial regimes or family-based dynasties must end, just as happened to Hosni Mubarak, Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, Ali Abdullah Saleh and others.

Hours before the fall of Al Assad, I called on Arab rulers to reconcile with their people before the flood comes rushing through. And now the flood has begun to rage from Damascus, and I believe, it will not stop.

It will inevitably sweep away other rulers of this era who accepted humiliation, disgrace, betrayal and throwing themselves into the arms of Tel Aviv, Washington and other capitals of crime.

What happened recently in Syria will be a prelude to the other Arab peoples. I feel very optimistic, and I believe we are facing radical changes that will affect the Arab world, and I do not know who will be the next ruler to be swept away by this deluge?

Thanks to the Al-Aqsa flood that exposed, revealed and disgraced many of the treasonous and collaborating regimes in our Arab world.

This flood will be followed by a flood of another kind, which will sweep away with it every slacker, and everyone who betrayed and conspired against Palestine, its resistance and its people, and threw himself into the arms of the criminal West, and ignored what is happening in Gaza, which will be, God willing, the main reason for uprooting many of the apostate Zionist regimes.

The majority of the Arab peoples are now yearning for change, and even salvation from injustice and oppression, and I do not believe that the Arab situation will continue in this way, and the Syrian situation will constitute an important factor for the peoples to pounce and revolt against rulers who are certainly not of the Arab caliber, and I am certain that this will not last long.

Many of the Arab rulers are feeling their heads today, and perhaps they are working on reconsidering their calculations if they can, and they realize that when the people have their say, the end of the regime will be inevitable.

So will these people learn from what happened recently in Damascus? The wise man is is the one who learns from others. Who will be the next ruler who will follow Mr. Al Assad?

Whoever has the answer, let him tell us, and he will have a great prize presented by the poor servant who wrote this article, which is a kiss on his forehead, and kisses on the foreheads of all the free revolutionaries of the nation, and at the forefront of the heroic revolutionaries of Gaza.

This article was written by Palestinian writer Dr Mohammad Abu Baker for Al Rai Al Youm in Arabic and reprinted in www.crossfirearabia.com

CrossFireArabia

Dr. Marwan Asmar holds a PhD from Leeds University and is a freelance writer specializing on the Middle East. He has worked as a journalist since the early 1990s in Jordan and the Gulf countries, and been widely published, including at Albawaba, Gulf News, Al Ghad, World Press Review and others.

Opinion

Trump, Iran And The ‘Nuclear Fight’

CrossFireArabia
April 3, 2025

Experts say the Middle East region is poised on an impending war with the top protagonists being the USA, Israel and Iran. They stand on a military pedestal of violent conflict where Armageddon has become the new catchphrase.

The man at the center of it all is US president Donald Trump who has been elected on a so-called global “peace” ticket but is fueling the worldwide escalation with his rhetoric.

He is telling Iran, nay warning it, to either hitch out and agree to a new accord on the country’s nuclear file or face the American wrath where its Persian cities and nuclear facilities would be wildly attacked in a first-time development that is turning international relations upside down.

And so a war of words began between Tehran and Washington since Trump sent a stern letter to Iran’s spiritual leader, Ayatollah Ali Hosseini Khamenei, telling him to submit to a new nuclear agreement to stall his country’s nuclear facilities or face extensive US bombing.

This was a callous, stark warning. The international system has never, till now, faced such discursive diplomatic parlance, even at the height of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union.

The Iranian leadership saw Trump’s verbiage as an outright threat and refused to submit, even telling US president that Iran will not be bullied and he can to “go to hell”, a comment made by Iranian president Massoud Pezeshkian. He was speaking for the Ayatollah and the top leadership in the country.

Since then however, and in spite of the occasional utterings, recently made by Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Iraghchi that Tehran would respond quickly and heavily to any outside attack, both sides have been involved in a “jostling affair” issuing different and irk statements short of the war-mongering tirade Trump started.

Military brink

Today, and on the face of it, both sides appear to want to pull back from the military brink. The Iranians are now saying they would be prepared to negotiate but only indirectly through Oman, the country that has traditionally served as a consummate link between Washington and Tehran.

Whilst the Trump administration may be contemplating such a fact, although it’s on record for stating it would prefer direct face-to-face negotiations involving fully-fledged American and Iranian expert teams in the field of nuclear weapons and proliferation, Washington has not closed the doors to such an offer from Tehran and it is still considering it which means it might be softening its position.

But there is another snag to this. Iranian officials have stated they want confidence-building measures from the Trump administration and don’t believe in negotiations under threat but this appears to be what is happening today.

As the diplomatic chit chat continues, Washington is sending military reinforcements with jet fighters, mass bombs and missiles to the Indian Ocean, Arabian Sea and the Red Sea as part of their stepped-up fight against the Houthis and potentially against Iran, both of whom are against the Israeli military onslaught on the Gaza Strip which is being financed by the USA.

Thus, what is happening now is that both sides are involved in sending out mixed signals despite the military escalation and war of words with Trump in what is becoming his customary U-turns. He is now saying that he doesn’t want a fight with Iran and is prepared for negotiations.

But the ball is turning so to speak. For one thing Israel has long sought deadly strikes on Iranian cities and nuclear facilities and for it, today this is a “golden opportunity” being flanked and supported by US warships in the area.

Israel sees such a series of strikes as more urgent than before because after 2018 when Trump got the USA out of the nuclear deal, Iran started once again to boost its uranium enrichment program and many argue it’s very near to achieving a nuclear bomb and capability.

But that may be over-stating the fact, because Iran has always stated its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes and its officials have maintained an official dialogue with the countries it originally made a deal with in 2015 officially named as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).

So the current escalation may be tinged with diplomatic talk for although Trump maybe rash in what he says, there is usually a back up plan up his sleeve of not reaching beyond the military brink with brinkmanship being played at the highest levels.

This comment is written by Dr Marwan Asmar, chief editor of the crossfirearabia.com website.

Opinion

Gaza Cracks Trump’s Image as ‘Peacemaker’

CrossFireArabia
March 29, 2025

By Giorgio Cafiero

The Gaza ceasefire had been extremely fragile ever since its implementation on Jan. 19. Many analysts doubted that phase two would begin, and the main question was about when, not if, the ceasefire would fall apart. It came as no surprise when Israel completely ended the ceasefire on March 18 and resumed its genocidal war on Gaza, killing roughly 600 [1] Palestinians within the first four days after the truce collapsed.

It is beyond disturbing to think about what will come next for the 2.2 million people in Gaza, especially given that Israeli authorities imposed [2] a blockade on all humanitarian aid on March 2. While briefing the UN Security Council on the day Israel resumed its war, UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Tom Fletcher said [3] “food is rotting and medicines are expiring.” The Israelis quickly undid all humanitarian progress achieved by international actors during the 42-day ceasefire. “Essential survival resources needed are now being rationed,” warned [4] Fletcher.

For all the misleading and outright inaccurate reporting in the Western media, it is clear that Hamas wanted phase two to begin, which was supposed to take place on March 1. However, Israel wanted phase one extended and was against moving into phase two. Had the second phase begun, Hamas would have handed over all the remaining Israeli captives. Now, amid this intense warfare, Hamas claims it is considering US Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff’s “Bridge Proposal,” which aims to extend the collapsed ceasefire into next month, beyond Ramadan and Passover, to permit negotiations for a permanent ceasefire to end this war.

It is not difficult to understand why this genocide resumed on March 18. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his allies in the government were crystal clear that they did not support the ceasefire and wanted Israeli military operations against Gaza to resume. It was only pressure from the incoming Donald Trump administration during the final days of Joe Biden’s presidency that led Tel Aviv to agree to the tenuous ceasefire. Now that the Trump administration removed that pressure on Israel and the American president went all-out with his rhetoric about “hell” in Gaza, Netanyahu received the green light from the White House to continue the genocide.

Trump’s desires and reality

What US President Donald Trump realistically sought to achieve with his obscene rhetoric about a “clean out” [6] of Gaza and outlandish talk of transforming the war-ravaged enclave into the “Riviera of the Middle East” [7] is a question for another article. Nonetheless, it is easy to conclude that such language emboldened the most right-wing and aggressive Israeli elements, including those in the government. These extremists have spent decades fantasizing about a second Nakba and establishing a Palestinian state outside Palestine.

Put simply, for Netanyahu and those around him to champion this plan of mass ethnic cleansing and forced displacement of millions of Palestinians into Egypt, Jordan, and perhaps also some Gulf Arab countries, continuing the war on Gaza is a necessary part of this process. After all, human history has shown that people don’t volunteer to leave their ancestral homeland but typically only do as a result of massive bloodshed.

The Israeli leadership understands this about the Palestinians and their quest to remain on their land. So much was on display with the leaflets [8] that Israel’s military recently dropped on Gaza, which threatened to make Trump’s plan for a “clean out” of Gaza the new reality.

To be sure, Israel’s domestic politics and Netanyahu’s own legal situation were relevant factors too. By restarting the war on Gaza, Netanyahu was able to secure stability within his own coalition. Now, not only is there no reason for him to fear more cabinet members quitting the coalition, but former Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir who left in January because of the ceasefire has returned [9] due to the genocide’s resumption.

Meanwhile, Netanyahu’s testimony in his corruption trial, set for the day that the war on Gaza recommenced, was postponed, [10] highlighting how “security developments” [11] shield him from legal consequences for his alleged [12] breach of trust, bribery, and fraud.

A key question is, where does this all leave Trump? After all, he campaigned on being a “peacemaker” president. While delivering his inaugural address just over two months ago, Trump declared, [13] “We will measure our success not only by the battles we win but also by the wars that we end — and perhaps most importantly, the wars we never get into.”

At this point, Trump might find himself trapped in Gaza, preventing him from reducing the US military footprint in the Middle East. Trump is escalating conflicts in the region—from Gaza to Yemen and possibly soon Iran—that could keep the US bogged down in this part of the world, which is the opposite of his promises regarding US foreign policy if elected to a second term. It remains to be seen how Trump’s support for Israel’s actions in Gaza and his escalation in Yemen—closely tied to Palestine—will impact his standing among his MAGA base.

The author is the CEO of Gulf States Analytics

[1] https://www.euronews.com/2025/03/22/israel-orders-idf-troops-to-advance-deeper-into-gaza-as-renewed-operation-expands

[2] https://edition.cnn.com/2025/03/02/middleeast/israel-halts-gaza-humanitarian-aid-intl-hnk/index.html

[3, 4] https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/03/1161246

[5] https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/israel-intensifying-gaza-strikes-press-hamas-into-freeing-hostages-defence-2025-03-21/

[6] https://edition.cnn.com/2025/01/27/middleeast/trump-clean-out-gaza-middle-east-intl/index.html

[7] https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/trumps-gaza-israel-plans-riviera-rcna190748

[8] https://www.newarab.com/news/israel-drops-leaflets-saying-no-one-will-care-if-gazans-vanish

[9] https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/3/18/israels-ben-gvir-to-rejoin-netanyahus-government

[10,11,12] https://www.middleeasteye.net/live-blog/live-blog-update/report-netanyahus-testimony-corruption-trial-postponed-due-gaza-war

[13] https://www.whitehouse.gov/remarks/2025/01/the-inaugural-address/

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Syria on Deluge For Arab ‘Regime Change’

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